Tag: mark wilson

Employees have turned to side jobs, food donations and online fundraising campaigns since the shutdown began Dec. 21. There are approximately 1,800 campaigns to raise money for those affected by the stalemate on the fundraising website GoFundMe, according to GoFundMe spokesperson Katherine Cichy. The campaigns ask for money to pay rent, buy food, make student loan payments and repair cars. Cichy said GoFundMe has a team to verify the identity of campaign organizers and ensure contributions go to

Federal employees and contractors have been forced to take creative measures to make ends meet as the government shutdown enters its 26th day with no clear end in sight.

Employees have turned to side jobs, food donations and online fundraising campaigns since the shutdown began Dec. 21. Some 800,000 federal employees are either furloughed or working without pay.

There are approximately 1,800 campaigns to raise money for those affected by the stalemate on the fundraising website GoFundMe, according to GoFundMe spokesperson Katherine Cichy. The campaigns have raised over $400,000 total, Cichy said.

The campaigns ask for money to pay rent, buy food, make student loan payments and repair cars. People affected by the shutdown share stories of upcoming births and weddings, marred by financial uncertainty.

Scott Jones is a biologist with the United States Geological Survey and missed his first paycheck Jan. 14. He and his wife Kelly started a GoFundMe campaign, which has raised $9,000, the same day he missed the check.

The couple’s third child is due in mid-February, and their savings are drained from a cross-country move to take the job with the USGS. After being in graduate school with two young children, Jones said he understands financial stress. But this timing is particularly bad.

“We have a new baby coming next month,” he said. “When you have a new baby, that’s a different ball game. I can go without, a baby can’t.”

The Joneses’ story is one of hundreds posted to the GoFundMe website.

Another family in Louisiana asked for $5,000 to pay bills, including a mortgage, and other expenses before the birth of their son. Taylor Jenkins, who wrote the GoFundMe page, said she feared the shutdown would affect her newborn’s health.

As a government contractor, my company allowed us to use borrowed PTO to help during the first couple of weeks during the shutdown, however I will soon have exhausted all allotted PTO for the next year. This really sucks because I will have a newborn baby who will need me to take him to doctors appointments and care for him if he becomes ill, but I will no long have the PTO to do that.

The pleas come from federal employees and contractors from a variety of departments. Members of the military, librarians, scientists and TSA officers are asking for help.

Nila Cleckley writes that she is working 40 hours a week without a paycheck, and bills are starting to pile up. She has two sons and no family or friends to help.

I really don’t know how I’m gonna put gas in my car to make it back in forth and to work. I am already living pay check to pay check.I just don’t know how I’m Gonna make it. I’m never one to beg or ask for help but this is my only option.

Brandon Walker says he’s worked at the U.S. Department of Agriculture for eight years, and needs help paying student loans and rent.

Since I have been furloughed, I have been volunteering at the Capital Area Food Bank as well as the DC Central Kitchen. I hate to appear as though I am begging, however this is a emergency.

Cichy said GoFundMe has a team to verify the identity of campaign organizers and ensure contributions go to people affected by the shutdown.

Donations are backed by the GoFundMe Guarantee, which ensures that donors’ money is going where they think it is, Cichy said. If donated funds are misused, the money will be refunded.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Sunday that a rift between Qatar and its Arab Gulf neighbors had gone on for too long. The United States, an ally of the six-nation Sunni Muslim GCC, sees the rift as a threat to efforts to contain Iran and has pushed for a united Gulf front. “When we have a common challenge, disputes between countries with shared objectives are never helpful,” he said at a press conference in the Qatari capital Doha. “They never permit you to have as robust a response

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Sunday that a rift between Qatar and its Arab Gulf neighbors had gone on for too long.

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and non-Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member Egypt cut diplomatic, transport and trade ties with Qatar in June 2017, accusing it of supporting terrorism and their regional foe Shi’ite Muslim Iran – something Doha denies.

The United States, an ally of the six-nation Sunni Muslim GCC, sees the rift as a threat to efforts to contain Iran and has pushed for a united Gulf front.

“When we have a common challenge, disputes between countries with shared objectives are never helpful,” he said at a press conference in the Qatari capital Doha.

“They never permit you to have as robust a response to common adversaries or common challenges as you might,” he added.

Doha says the boycott aims to undermine its sovereignty.

“We’re hoping that the unity of GCC will increase in the days and weeks and months ahead,” Pompeo said, adding that Gulf unity was essential for a planned Middle East Strategic Alliance that would also include Jordan and Egypt.

Fed Chairman Jerome Powell reiterated on Thursday the U.S. central bank has the ability to be patient on monetary policy given that inflation remains stable. Fed Vice Chair Richard Clarida also struck a dovish tone, underscoring the central bank’s willingness to remain patient on the issue of raising rates. “The Fed Funds Rate is no longer accommodative but neutral, and more importantly, positive in real terms. In line with a more patient Fed, the U.S. dollar’ rise will become gentler,” said Phi

The dollar fell versus its major peers on Friday, as investors grew increasingly confident that the U.S. Federal Reserve may hit the pause button on monetary tightening this year.

Fed Chairman Jerome Powell reiterated on Thursday the U.S. central bank has the ability to be patient on monetary policy given that inflation remains stable. Markets are now pricing in no further rate hikes by the Fed this year.

“The market has almost priced in that the Fed will not be hiking rates any further. To get the dollar weaker, market now has to expect a rate cut…I don’t see that happening,” said Sim Moh Siong, currency strategist at Bank of Singapore.

Sentiment was still slightly cautious in Asian trade on a lack of concrete details from the United States and China on any progress in their trade dispute after a three-day meeting in Beijing. The two sides are more than halfway through a 90-day truce agreed by U.S. President Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.

Traders still remain optimistic that a trade deal between the world’s largest economies will eventually materialize. U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said late on Thursday that Chinese Vice Premier Liu He will “most likely” visit Washington later in January for trade talks.

Bank of Singapore’s Sim added that currencies such as the Australian dollar, a gauge of risk appetite, and the New Zealand dollar, are likely to see further gains if a U.S.-Sino trade deal is reached.

The Aussie dollar was last at $0.7201, gaining 0.2 percent versus the greenback, while the kiwi firmed 0.44 percent to $0.6808.

The dollar also fell 0.47 percent versus the offshore yuan to 6.7602. The yuan is now at its strongest since late July last year.

The dollar index fell by 0.17 percent to 95.37. The index has fallen around 2.2 percent since mid-December on expectations that a slowdown in growth, both in the United States as well as globally, will restrict the Fed from raising rates in 2019.

In 2018, the greenback outperformed its peers, gaining 4.3 percent as the Fed hiked rates four times on the back of a strong domestic economy, falling unemployment and rising wage pressures. This has caused traders to turn bearish on the dollar.

However, few analysts still forecast a rising dollar for this year.

“The Fed Funds Rate is no longer accommodative but neutral, and more importantly, positive in real terms. In line with a more patient Fed, the U.S. dollar’ rise will become gentler,” said Philip Wee, currency strategist at DBS in a note.

The euro gained 0.2 percent to $1.1519, after losing 0.4 percent of its value in the previous session. The single currency has been pressured by a slew of weaker-than-expected economic data, especially from France and Germany.

The European Central Bank is widely expected to remain accommodative in 2019, which should keep a lid on the single currency.

Elsewhere, sterling traded marginally firmer, fetching $1.2752 in early Asian trade with traders focused on the progress of Brexit.

British Prime Minister Theresa May must win a vote in parliament to get her Brexit deal approved or risk seeing Britain’s exit from the European Union descend into chaos. The vote is now due to take place on Jan. 15. The numbers are not in May’s favor and her chances of winning the vote look extremely slim.

The dollar weakened versus the Canadian dollar by 0.17 percent to C$1.3211. The greenback has lost 3.25 percent against the loonie over the last six sessions, with the commodity-linked currency bolstered by a rebound in oil prices.

Powell’s colleague Raphael Bostic, the Atlanta Fed President, added to the central bank’s dovish tone on Monday. “The Fed is listening to the market and has acknowledged flashing market signs,” said Sim Moh Siong, currency strategist at Bank of Singapore. “U.S. inflation has been well behaved so far and so the Fed does have room to pause on its rate hike cycle,” added Sim. The dollar had gained 4.3 percent in 2018 as the Fed hiked rates four times on the back of a strong domestic economy, fallin

The dollar struggled for traction against its peers on Tuesday, with investors increasingly convinced the Federal Reserve will not raise interest rates this year amid risks of a sharper slowdown in global growth.

The greenback was marginally firmer against the yen, after falling 0.2 percent earlier in the session as traders wagered that the monetary tightening cycle in the world’s largest economy has been halted for the year.

On Friday, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell told the American Economic Association the Fed is not on a preset path of rate hikes and it will be sensitive to the downside risks markets are pricing in.

Powell’s colleague Raphael Bostic, the Atlanta Fed President, added to the central bank’s dovish tone on Monday. Bostic, who is not a voting member of the Federal Open Market Committee this year, said the Fed may only need to raise rates once in 2019.

“The Fed is listening to the market and has acknowledged flashing market signs,” said Sim Moh Siong, currency strategist at Bank of Singapore.

“U.S. inflation has been well behaved so far and so the Fed does have room to pause on its rate hike cycle,” added Sim.

The dollar index was marginally higher, fetching 95.80 at 0244 GMT. Earlier in the session, it had hit an intra-day low of 95.68.

The index has lost around 2 percent since mid-December, and has followed a decline in U.S. bond yields as market participants have grown increasingly confident that the Fed will not hike rates in 2019.

The dollar had gained 4.3 percent in 2018 as the Fed hiked rates four times on the back of a strong domestic economy, falling unemployment and rising wage pressures.

But market expectations for further Fed tightening this year have shifted markedly in the last few months, with some traders now expecting even a rate cut this year.

Financial markets have been rattled by heightened worries about slowing global growth, especially in the United States and China, though data on Friday showed strong U.S. job growth.

Expectations of no further rate hikes this year are likely to keep the greenback under pressure.

The euro was down 0.2 percent at $1.1448, after touching an intra-day high of $1.1485. The single currency has gained around 1.3 percent over the last three trading sessions as the outlook towards the greenback weakened.

The euro’s recent strength has surprised some analysts as growth and inflation remain weak in the eurozone, well below European Central Bank forecasts.

“Having consolidated in a 200-pip range for a large part of the past 2 months, the pair is prime for a breakout,” said Kathy Lien, managing director of currency strategy at BKX Asset Management in a note.

The British pound changed hands at $1.2787, relatively unchanged from its previous close. Traders expect sterling to remain volatile over the next few weeks due to Brexit woes.

Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May must win a vote in parliament to get her Brexit deal approved or risk seeing Britain’s exit from the European Union descend into chaos. The vote is now due to take place the week beginning Jan. 14.

May’s chances of winning the vote look slim as the DUP, the small Northern Irish party that usually props up her government, is opposed to the deal.

Elsewhere, the Australian dollar was lower by 0.15 percent at $0.7136. Despite its weakness on Tuesday, traders remain positive on the Aussie dollar over the short term.

Sentiment has been buoyed by aggressive stimulus measures in China, Australia’s largest importer of commodities, and also improved prospects for a U.S.-China trade deal.

U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross predicted on Monday that Beijing and Washington could reach a trade deal that “we could live with”.

The new Democratic-held House passed legislation Thursday night that would end a partial government shutdown. As the measures do not include money for President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall, he has vowed not to sign them. It leaves lawmakers and the White House no closer to breaking an impasse over the border barrier as the government shutdown nears the end of its 13th day. A Wednesday briefing on border security at the White House yielded no results, and Democrats emerged from it even mo

The new Democratic-held House passed legislation Thursday night that would end a partial government shutdown.

Passage of the spending packages will not move Congress closer to reopening nine unfunded federal departments for now. As the measures do not include money for President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall, he has vowed not to sign them.

Facing Trump’s veto threat, the Senate will not “waste its time” to pass the House proposal, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Thursday. It leaves lawmakers and the White House no closer to breaking an impasse over the border barrier as the government shutdown nears the end of its 13th day.

Bipartisan congressional leaders will head to the White House for negotiations Friday as they try to bridge a divide over Trump’s demand for $5 billion for a wall. A Wednesday briefing on border security at the White House yielded no results, and Democrats emerged from it even more adamantly refusing to fund the barrier.

In an official statement of policy Thursday, the White House said Trump’s advisors would recommend that the president veto the Democratic proposals. The administration called for at least $5 billion for the wall. The president “cannot accept legislation that provides unnecessary funding for wasteful programs while ignoring the Nation’s border security needs,” the Trump administration wrote.

Let’s keep the strength going by waiting a little and not being too judgmental about rate hikes like some of your colleagues,” Cramer said. The “Mad Money” host reiterated his distaste in some Fed officials’ tendency to stick to traditional metrics when gauging how the economy is doing. “How can you claim to be data-dependent if you’ve made up your mind before you see the data that you need one or two more rate hikes to get back to normal?” The Fed, whose mission it is to keep inflation at bay w

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell just gave the stock market and the U.S. economy exactly what they needed to continue the steady growth they’ve seen in the last several years, CNBC’s Jim Cramer said Friday.

In a group interview with former Fed leaders Ben Bernanke and Janet Yellen, Powell said Friday that he would be “patient” with the central bank’s interest rate policies in the year ahead. The remark sent stocks soaring, with the Dow tacking on some 800 points intraday.

“Memo to Powell: keep listening. Be patient. Enjoy the employment gains. Let’s keep the strength going by waiting a little and not being too judgmental about rate hikes like some of your colleagues,” Cramer said.

The “Mad Money” host reiterated his distaste in some Fed officials’ tendency to stick to traditional metrics when gauging how the economy is doing.

“How can you claim to be data-dependent if you’ve made up your mind before you see the data that you need one or two more rate hikes to get back to normal?” he asked. “Normal is where the data says you should go. Normal is the natural progression of jobs being created without a lot of inflation. Normal is not a percent.”

The Fed, whose mission it is to keep inflation at bay while keeping people employed, will eventually have to reconsider what it sees as “normal” as a result of technology, Cramer continued.

“Every device is … designed to lay people off. Every software program you have is designed to let companies hire fewer people, because people are so expensive. Every invention of any note is about taking a job that’s done by 10 people and making it so it’s only two people, and they can do it better,” he said.

President Donald Trump sent mixed messages on Thursday over his willingness to shutdown the government over his proposed border wall, as polls show support for it rising among Americans. But hours later, the president repeated his demand for wall funding in a government spending bill. “We foolishly fight for Border Security for other countries – but not for our beloved U.S.A,” Trump wrote. Lawmakers must pass a spending bill before Friday at midnight to avoid a partial government shutdown. That’

President Donald Trump sent mixed messages on Thursday over his willingness to shutdown the government over his proposed border wall, as polls show support for it rising among Americans.

Early Thursday morning, Trump said in a post on Twitter that talk about the wall was distracting from the work being done by border patrol and the military. But hours later, the president repeated his demand for wall funding in a government spending bill.

In a morning tweet that came just three days after blasting Democrats for “saying that you can have good Border Security without a Wall,” the president, facing the diminishing viability of his plan, said that talk of the wall was distracting from the “great job being done on our Southern Border.”

“Remember the Caravans? Well, they didn’t get through and none are forming or on their way,” the president wrote. “Border is tight.”

Just before 11 a.m., the president wrote in a post that when he “begrudgingly signed the Omnibus Bill, I was promised the Wall and Border Security by leadership. Would be done by end of year (NOW). It didn’t happen!”

“We foolishly fight for Border Security for other countries – but not for our beloved U.S.A,” Trump wrote. “Not good!”

In a statement, The White House said shortly after the tweet was posted that, at the moment, “the President does not want to go further without border security, which includes steel slats or a wall.”

The conflicting messages, coming as the House GOP was meeting in a closed-door conference, have created an air of uncertainty as the president’s odds of securing funding have slipped.

It is not clear if the House will pass a bill staving off the looming government shutdown or if Trump will sign it. Lawmakers must pass a spending bill before Friday at midnight to avoid a partial government shutdown.

On Wednesday, Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell ignored the president’s demands for a wall by introducing a short-term spending measure that is silent on the issue. The measure, if approved in the House, will fund the government through the first week of February, punting the fight over the wall into the starting weeks of Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s term as Speaker of the House.

The measure disappointed the president’s conservative base, including traditional allies. Trump has yet to say if he will sign off on the plan. Building a wall along the southern border was a signature aspect of the president’s campaign for the presidency and played a key role at his political rallies, where he led chants of “Build that wall!”

Though the political outlook for the wall is grim, support among Americans has actually grown since Trump took office. Support hit a record last week, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released Tuesday, even as a majority of voters continue to oppose it.

A separate poll this month showed that 60 percent of Republicans believe wall funding is important enough to shut down the government — including nearly two-thirds of Republican men. That’s a dramatic increase from November, when only 49 percent of Republicans told the same pollsters that wall funding was important enough for a shutdown.

“If he agrees to the CR, which would continue funding the government at the current levels, he won’t get $1-point-anything [billion] for the wall,” Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy said Wednesday.

Read more As Trump holds out for border wall funding from Congress, GoFundMe raises over $3 million in 3 days

The House Freedom Caucus, the right-fringe of Republicans in the lower chamber, called on the president to veto McConnell’s proposal Wednesday night, and cited Trump’s previous remarks saying he would not sign another spending bill that did not include wall funding.

“I rise to encourage my colleagues to stay in the fight to have the president deliver on a promise,” caucus chairman Mark Meadows, R-N.C., said from the floor of the House. The freedom caucus, which was occasionally able to tank bills while Republicans held the majority, will lose that power once Democrats take control in two weeks.

In response to criticism from the base, the White House has issued a number of statements this week that have sought to create political space for the president to sign a bill that does not include wall funding.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders played down the president’s claim that he would be “proud” to have a shutdown over the issue, telling Fox News Tuesday that “at the end of the day we don’t want to shut down the government, we want to shut down the border.” She said that the White House had “other ways” of getting the $5 billion in funding for the wall that the president has demanded.

The next day, Trump said that that the military will build the wall — something that experts say is unlikely to be viable without congressional appropriations — and contended that “Mexico is paying (indirectly) for the Wall through the new USMCA, the replacement for NAFTA!”

But Thursday’s post suggests a new political argument from the president: That the border is already secure.

It is a point that Trump seemed to waver about on December 11 during a heated Oval Office confrontation with Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Pelosi.

The president told Schumer at the time that “if it’s not good border security, I won’t take it,” but told Schumer to “look at these numbers of the effectiveness of our border security,” and the job that the military was doing at the border.

Seemingly caught off guard, Schumer repeated to the president, “Yeah, you just said it’s effective.”

“Where you have walls, Chuck, it’s effective,” the president said. “Where you don’t have walls, it is not effective.”

On Tuesday afternoon, Schumer told reporters that he thought the “Republican offer today would not pass either chamber.” The White House appears to want to claim that funding as “wall” money to promote a victory. On Tuesday, Pelosi told reporters that “we’ll see” if negotiations with the White House make any progress. Trump’s push for wall money as part of Department of Homeland Security funding has snagged talks to dodge a shutdown. Leaving McConnell’s office Tuesday, the New York Democrat said

Schumer met with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday. The Kentucky Republican proposed an appropriations bill that includes money for border security fencing, as well as what a Senate Democratic aide described as a $1 billion “slush fund” that Trump could use on his immigration policies. Democrats rejected the deal.

A McConnell spokesman later told NBC News that the “hypothetical slush fund” would not go toward a wall. Speaking to reporters Tuesday afternoon, McConnell said he offered a plan to Schumer that he “thought was reasonable to both sides.” He later heard back from the Democratic leader “that the offer was not acceptable,” he said.

On Tuesday afternoon, Schumer told reporters that he thought the “Republican offer today would not pass either chamber.” However, he said Democrats would “very seriously consider” a short-term measure to keep the government open if McConnell offered it.

Despite the lack of a deal, the Senate GOP leader said he is confident the government will not shut down. McConnell said is consulting the White House on how to move forward, and he hopes to hear more later Tuesday about what the president would support. He called the Trump administration “extremely flexible” on the issue.

In proposing $1.6 billion in border security funding, Schumer has said it would go to building new or repairing existing fences, rather than the wall as Trump has proposed it. The White House appears to want to claim that funding as “wall” money to promote a victory.

Trump has also claimed his administration has built large portions of the wall. But Congress has only authorized money to build fencing similar to existing structures. The president has also contended that the military could build the wall — though the Pentagon has said it has no plans to do so, yet.

On Tuesday, Pelosi told reporters that “we’ll see” if negotiations with the White House make any progress. She said the wall “is not about money,” but rather “about morality.”

“It’s the wrong thing to do. It doesn’t work. It’s not effective. It’s the wrong thing to do and it’s a waste of money,” the California Democrat said, according to NBC News.

The president has already signed spending bills for five government agencies, including the massive Departments of Defense and Health and Human Services, into law. Lawmakers still have not passed spending bills for five agencies. Trump’s push for wall money as part of Department of Homeland Security funding has snagged talks to dodge a shutdown.

Schumer said Tuesday morning that he and Pelosi had not heard from the White House on two offers it made to avoid a shutdown. One includes appropriations bills for six agencies and a year-long continuing resolution to fund DHS. The other would pass a continuing resolution to keep all seven departments running.

Schumer again urged Republicans to support one of those plans on Tuesday afternoon.

Leaving McConnell’s office Tuesday, the New York Democrat said he had not heard a “peep” from the White House, according to NBC News.

As only about a quarter of the government would shut down this weekend, it would have only limited effects. Along with Homeland Security, the unfunded agencies are the departments of Transportation, Commerce, Interior, Agriculture, Housing and Urban Development and Justice.

While some functions like national parks would close down, some employees and law enforcement officers at those agencies would continue working without getting paid temporarily. Those would include employees such as FBI, border patrol and Transportation Security Administration agents.

Bush’s service dog, Sully, was taken to the viewing, too — his main service these last months since Barbara Bush’s death in April being to rest his head on her husband’s lap. Former President George W. Bush and his wife greeted the Trumps outside before everyone went in for the private, 20-minute visit. Although Trump will attend Bush’s service, he is not among the eulogists. The late President Bush called Trump a “blowhard.” Bush’s death reduces membership in the ex-presidents’ club to four: Ji

On Tuesday, soldiers, citizens in wheelchairs and long lines of others on foot wound through the Capitol Rotunda to view Bush’s casket and honor a president whose legacy included World War military service and a landmark law affirming the rights of the disabled. Former Sen. Bob Dole, a compatriot in war, peace and political struggle, steadied himself out of his wheelchair and saluted his old friend and one-time rival.

After the national funeral service at the cathedral, Bush’s remains will be returned to Houston to lie in repose at St. Martin’s Episcopal Church before burial Thursday at his family plot on the presidential library grounds at Texas A&M University in College Station. His final resting place will be alongside Barbara Bush, his wife of 73 years who died in April, and Robin Bush, the daughter they lost to leukemia in 1953 at age 3.

Trump ordered the federal government closed Wednesday for a national day of mourning. Flags on public buildings are flying at half-staff for 30 days.

As at notable moments in his life, Bush brought together Republicans and Democrats in his death, and not only the VIPs.

Members of the public who never voted for the man waited in the same long lines as the rest, attesting that Bush possessed the dignity and grace that deserved to be remembered by their presence on a cold overcast day in the capital.

“I’m just here to pay my respects,” said Jane Hernandez, a retired physician in the heavily Democratic city and suburbs. “I wasn’t the biggest fan of his presidency, but all in all he was a good, sincere guy doing a really hard job as best he could.”

Bush’s service dog, Sully, was taken to the viewing, too — his main service these last months since Barbara Bush’s death in April being to rest his head on her husband’s lap. Service dogs are trained to do that.

The CIA also honored Bush, the only spy chief to become president, as three agency directors past and present joined the public in the viewing.

In the midst of the period of mourning, first lady Melania Trump gave Laura Bush, one of her predecessors, a tour of holiday decorations at the White House, a “sweet visit during this somber week,” as Mrs. Bush’s Instagram account put it. And the Trumps visited members of the Bush family at the Blair House presidential guesthouse, where they are staying. Former President George W. Bush and his wife greeted the Trumps outside before everyone went in for the private, 20-minute visit.

Although Trump will attend Bush’s service, he is not among the eulogists. They are, in addition to Bush’s eldest son, Alan Simpson, the former senator and acerbic wit from Wyoming; Brian Mulroney, the former Canadian prime minister who also gave a eulogy for Ronald Reagan; and presidential historian Jon Meacham.

People lined up before dawn to pay respects to the 41st president, a son and father of privilege now celebrated by everyday citizens for his common courtesies and depth of experience.

“He was so qualified, and I think he was just a decent man,” said Sharon Terry, touring Washington with friends from an Indianapolis garden club. Said her friend Sue Miller, also in line for the viewing: “I actually think I underestimated him when he was in office. My opinion of him went up seeing how he conducted himself as a statesman afterward.”

Fred Curry, one of the few African-Americans in line, is a registered Democrat from Hyattsville, Maryland, who voted for Bush in 1988, the election won by the one-term president. “Honestly I just liked him,” he said. “He seemed like a sincere and decent man and you couldn’t argue with his qualifications.”

Inside the Capitol, Sully, the 2-year-old Labrador retriever assigned to Bush, sat by the casket in the company of people who came to commemorate Bush’s signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the 1990 law that, among its many provisions, required businesses that prohibit pets to give access to service dogs.

“After Mrs. Bush’s death, general companionship was a big part of Sully’s job,” John Miller, president and CEO of America’s VetDogs, said in a phone interview. “One of the things that I think was important to the president was the rest command, where Sully would rest his head on the president’s lap.”

The law was just one point of intersection for Bush and Dole, now 95, who was one of its leading advocates in the Senate.

They were fellow World War II veterans, Republican Party leaders, fierce rivals for the 1988 Republican presidential nomination won by Bush (“Stop lying about my record,” Dole snapped at Bush) and skilled negotiators. Dole, an Army veteran hit by German machine gunfire in Italy, has gone through life with a disabled right arm. Bush, a Navy pilot, survived a bail-out from his stricken aircraft over the Pacific and an earlier crash landing.

On Tuesday, Dole was helped out of his wheelchair by an aide, slowly steadied himself and saluted Bush with his left hand, his chin quivering.

Dignitaries had come forward on Monday, too, to honor the Texan whose service to his country extended three quarters of a century, from World War II through his final years as an advocate for volunteerism and relief for people displaced by natural disaster. Bush, 94, died Friday.

Trump’s relationship with the Bush family has been tense. The current president has mocked the elder Bush for his “thousand points of light” call to volunteerism, challenged his son’s legacy as president and trounced “low-energy” Jeb Bush in the Republican presidential primaries en route to office. The late President Bush called Trump a “blowhard.”

Those insults have been set aside, but the list of funeral service speakers marked the first time since Lyndon Johnson’s death in 1973 that a sitting president was not tapped to eulogize a late president. (Clinton did so for Richard Nixon, and George W. Bush eulogized Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford.)

Bush’s death reduces membership in the ex-presidents’ club to four: Jimmy Carter, Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama.

Trump told The Wall Street Journal in an interview Monday that he spoke with Barra on Sunday night to discuss the downsizing plan. He told her that GM should stop making cars in China and open a new plant in Ohio to replace the ones being closed. “They better damn well open a new plant there very quickly,” Trump told the Journal. “I love Ohio,” Trump said. The Journal’s interview was published shortly after Trump told journalists outside the White House that he wasn’t happy with GM’s plan.

President Donald Trump on Monday tore into General Motors for its newly announced plan to halt production at multiple plants in the U.S. and Canada, telling reporters that he warned GM CEO Mary Barra that her company was “playing around with the wrong person.”

GM’s plan to cease operations at plants in Ohio, Michigan, Maryland and Ontario by next year — and to cut back production at two other plants, as well — will cost up to $3.8 billion and shrink the Detroit-based carmaker by more than 14,000 jobs, or about 15 percent of its salaried staff.

Trump told The Wall Street Journal in an interview Monday that he spoke with Barra on Sunday night to discuss the downsizing plan. He told her that GM should stop making cars in China and open a new plant in Ohio to replace the ones being closed.

“They better damn well open a new plant there very quickly,” Trump told the Journal. “I love Ohio,” Trump said. “I told them, ‘you’re playing around with the wrong person,'” he added, according to the newspaper.

Trump continued: “I said, ‘I heard you’re closing your plant,'” he recalled from his conversation with Barra. “‘It’s not going to be closed for long, I hope, Mary, because if it is you have a problem.'”

The president, who had lamented the empty factories and depressed rural towns when he visited the state in July 2017, had promised the state’s residents that their jobs are “all coming back.” He won the state in 2016 by more than 8 percentage points.

Trump joined Ohio leaders, including several Democrats, in blasting the move. Sen. Sherrod Brown, a potential 2020 rival for Trump, called the decision “corporate greed at its worst.”

Barra insisted that GM’s restructuring was a pre-emptive step to take during strong economic times to protect her company through a future economic slowdown while continuing to invest in new technologies, the Journal reported.

The Journal’s interview was published shortly after Trump told journalists outside the White House that he wasn’t happy with GM’s plan. He also noted that the Chevrolet Cruze was not selling well and urged the company to put something else in its place. GM killed the Cruze and several other passenger cars as part of its cost-cutting plan, USA Today reported Monday.

“I said, ‘then put a car in here that is selling well, but get it opened fast,'” the president said in the Journal interview.

Meanwhile, Barra met with Trump’s top economic advisor, Larry Kudlow, on Monday at the White House.

The president’s remarks came as he was headed to Mississippi, where he plans to host two rallies in support of GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith, who has come under fire — including from former corporate donors — for remarks viewed as racially insensitive.